Cheryl Quotes & Sayings

There were times in my career I went a little further than I wanted because of expectations. Doing certain things onstage when children were in the audience, wearing certain clothes, singing certain lyrics. — Cheryl James

The quality of films out there depends on how much responsibility we're willing to take. I try to play women who are positive and heroic. — Cheryl Ladd

This was once Mazama, I kept reminding myself. This was once a mountain that stood nearly 12,000 feet tall and then had its heart removed. This was once a wasteland of lava and pumice and ash. This was once an empty bowl that took hundreds of years to fill. But hard as I tried, I couldn't see them in my mind's eye. Not the mountain or the wasteland or the empty bowl. They simply were not there anymore. There was only the stillness and the silence of that water: what a mountain and a wasteland and an empty bowl turned into after the healing process. — Cheryl Strayed

That my complicated life could be made so simple was astounding. — Cheryl Strayed

Well, I was born in Miami, and then I lived for a long time in Tallahassee, and before that, Winter Haven, which is a tiny town in Florida. I was not a city girl. — Cheryl Hines

How fabulous down was for those first minutes! Down, down, down I'd go until down too became impossible and punishing and so relentless that I'd pray for the trail to go back up. Going down, I realized was like taking hold of the loose strand of yarn on a sweater you'd just spent hours knitting and pulling it until the entire sweater unraveled into a pile of string. Hiking the PCT was the maddening effort of knitting that sweater and unraveling it over and over again. As if everything gained was inevitably lost. — Cheryl Strayed

Ask yourself: What is the best I can do? And then do that. — Cheryl Strayed

God's plan for our life is one that continuously unfolds. Minute-by-minute, day-by-day, and step-by-step He guides, all the while unfolding His glorious intentions. — Cheryl Zelenka

I know it's hard to write, darling. But it's harder not to. The only way you'll find out if you "have it in you" is to get to work and see if you do. — Cheryl Strayed

I started playing poker in 2003 during my pregnancy, to distract myself from my awful morning sickness. For months all I did was cry and play Texas Hold'em. — Cheryl Hines

You are the agent of power in your sex life, even if what you want is to relinquish your power and agency while you're having sex. You can take that power back at any moment.
Which means, of course, that you always had it. — Cheryl Strayed

So many people imagine housekeeping to be boring, frustrating, repetitive, unintelligent drudgery. I cannot agree. In fact, having kept house, practiced law, taught, and done many other sorts of work, low and high-paid, I can assure you that it is actually lawyers who are most familiar with the experience of unintelligent drudgery. — Cheryl Mendelson

I'm done counting days. Now because of you I'm making the days count. — Cheryl McIntyre

It seemed to me the way it must feel to people who cut themselves on purpose. Not pretty, but clean. Not good, but void of regret. I was trying to heal. Trying to get the bad out of my system so I could be good again. To cure me of myself. — Cheryl Strayed

We are all at risk of something. Of ending up exactly where we began, of failing to imagine and find and know and actualize who we could be. The only difference is the distance of the leap. — Cheryl Strayed

I think it affected me physically and emotionally, yes. I did have my ups and downs, but I actually had more ups and downs after the shots were finished and she was pregnant because of the reality of being pregnant with twins. — Cheryl Tiegs

An REI worker had encouraged me to buy a box of Spenco 2nd Skin - gel patches meant to treat burns that also happened to be great for blisters. — Cheryl Strayed

One of my dearest friends took the photograph of me she kept in a frame, ripped it in half, and mailed it to me. — Cheryl Strayed

A caldera, it's called - a sort of mountain in reverse. A mountain that's had its very heart removed. — Cheryl Strayed

The other half of rising - the very half that makes rising necessary - is having been nailed to the cross. — Cheryl Strayed

The same as she'd always done when she'd seen me suffer because I wanted something to be different than it was and she was trying to convince me with that single word that I must accept things as they were. — Cheryl Strayed

my physical suffering some of my emotional suffering would fade away. — Cheryl Strayed

It was really over, I thought. There was no way to go back, to make it stay. There was never that. — Cheryl Strayed

For a woman to be a lesbian in a male-supremacist, capitalist, misogynist, racist, homophobic, imperialist culture, such as that of North America, is an act of resistance. — Cheryl Clarke

A man has the strength to face what he is thrown in life. If he falls or is beaten, he does not complain but gets up and rides in to face the challenge once more. — Cheryl Matthynssens

Sometimes the best way we can serve God is by honouring and taking care of that which has already been give to us. This, is my case, is my children. — Cheryl B. Evans

Open with my knife. Inside, carefully wrapped — Cheryl Strayed

The ultimate dwindling resource in the human arrangement isn't cheap oil or potable water or even common sense, but mercy. — Cheryl Strayed

I'm really 100 per cent invested in 'Suburgatory' right now - I'm really focused on that and really like taking it all in. It's so much fun and I just love this character and I love the guys I work with so I'm just enjoying this right now. — Cheryl Hines

I'm afraid that if I let myself feel this way I do about you, ugh, I'm so afraid you'll realize what I am, and you'll walk away. And it'll hurt me. — Cheryl McIntyre

A lot of people go off and have fun adventures, or hard adventures, and their impulse is to write about them right away. What really makes a difference is having some perspective on what happened. — Cheryl Strayed

A woman with long, blonde hair stood for a moment on the other side of the door. She looked similar to his date. Was she entering or leaving the coffee house?
Before Paul could confirm her identity or stand and run after her, she strode away and disappeared in the crowd. — Cheryl Sterling

Aside from marrying my husband and having my children, hiking the PCT was the best thing I ever did. The hike very literally forced me to put one foot in front of the other at a time when emotionally I didn't think I could do that. — Cheryl Strayed

By the way," I said, "I wanted to tell you - about why I decided to hike the PCT? I got divorced. I was married and not long ago I got divorced, and also about four years ago my mom died - she was only forty-five and she got cancer suddenly and died. It's been a hard time in my life and I've sort of gotten offtrack. So I ... " He opened his eyes wider, looking at me. "I thought it would help me find my center, to come out here." I made a crumpled gesture with my hands, out of words, a bit surprised that I'd let so many tumble out. — Cheryl Strayed

it is usually assumed that in a room with a slender therapist and a fat patient, it is the patient who has a weight problem. That therapist, benefitting from thin privilege may well assume that the way she eats, what she eats and how she exercises are what make her different from her patient, what make her thin and her patient fat. She may believe that because she carefully monitors what she eats and faithfully exercises, that she has control over her body, control that the fat woman could have if only she tried harder and did as she does. There is nothing in the media or even the professional literature to contradict her assumptions. — Cheryl Fuller

There are no composite characters or events in this book. I occasionally omitted people and events, but only when that omission had no impact on either the veracity or the substance of the story. — Cheryl Strayed

You can love someone, hell, you can love a lot of someones, but when you find the right person--the one that you're meant to be with--it's like..." "You can breathe for the first time," she finishes for me. "Yes." I cant help but smile.I needed to find that to understand." And you have," She says softly."Lucy." "Lucy," I agree. — Cheryl McIntyre

It had begun to occur to me that perhaps it was okay that I hadn't spent my days on the trail pondering the sorrows of my life, that perhaps by being forced to focus on my physical suffering some of my emotional suffering would fade away. By the end of that second week, I realized that since I'd begun my hike, I hadn't shed a single tear. — Cheryl Strayed

On my hike my brain was left to wander. That was often maddening because it was tedious and monotonous sometimes, but then my the mind would take over, and that's when I'd start hearing the music in my head or thinking deeply about people I know or things that I didn't even know I remembered anymore. Those thoughts would be there. I wouldn't have had them otherwise. — Cheryl Strayed

And you may not be able to see this yet, but perhaps there will come a time - it could be years from now - when you'll need to get on your horse and ride into battle and you're going to hesitate. You're going to falter. To heal the wound your father made, you're going to have to get on that horse and ride into battle like a warrior. — Cheryl Strayed

And the fuck is yours too, WTF. That question does not apply 'to everything every day.' If it does, you're wasting your life. If it does, you're a lazy coward and you are not a lazy coward.
Ask better questions, sweet pea. The fuck is your life. Answer it. — Cheryl Strayed

I'm like any other woman - my weight fluctuates. I have a pair of jeans one size bigger than the other just in case that week I'm a little bit heavier. — Cheryl Cole

Raise your energy. You attract what you radiate. — Cheryl Richardson

Like all people, there are days I feel beautiful and days I don't. When I don't, I do something about it. — Cheryl Tiegs

my knight in shining armour turned out to be a loser in aluminum foil. — Cheryl Lee

Will you permit God to stir the Holy Spirit within you today? Are you ready to seek out His perfect will for your life, even if it is contrary to your present hopes, dreams, and desires? Will you submit to any necessary change or refinement the Spirit exposes and requires, so that you may live a more serviceable and righteous witness for Christ? A major heart remodel may be necessary. The renovations could take many, many years to complete but the cathedral He creates within your very being will be magnificent. May His desire for your life be yours as well, from this very moment and throughout all of eternity. — Cheryl Zelenka

I can't say when you'll get love or how you'll find it or even promise you that you will. I can only say you are worthy of it and that it's never too much to ask for it and that it's not crazy to fear you'll never have it again, even though your fears are probably wrong. Love is our essential nutrient. Without it, life has little meaning. It's the best thing we have to give and the most valuable thing we receive. It's worthy of all the hullabaloo. — Cheryl Strayed

You have to surrender to your mediocrity, and just write. Because it's hard, really hard, to write even a crappy book. But it's better to write a book that kind of sucks rather than no book at all, as you wait around to magically become Faulkner. No one is going to write your book for you and you can't write anybody's book but your own. — Cheryl Strayed

So on one hand, because the wilderness was familiar to me, it really helped me be brave. But it still was scary sometimes. I had to say to myself: "Chances are, you're not going to be mauled by a bear." — Cheryl Strayed

You don't need a reason to leave. Wanting to leave is enough. Leaving doesn't mean you're incapable of real love or that you'll never love anyone else again. It doesn't mean you're morally bankrupt or psychologically demented or a nymphomaniac. It means you wish to change the terms of one particular relationship. That's all. Be brave enough to break your own heart. — Cheryl Strayed

I mean: be your best, most gigantic self. — Cheryl Strayed

I don't know what she's trying to say, but I can feel her struggle to get it out. "I love Skittles. — Cheryl McIntyre

You have to make peace with life. — Cheryl Ladd

Wounded?" was all I could manage. "Yes," said Pat. "And you're wounded in the same place. That's what fathers do if they don't heal their wounds. They wound their children in the same place. — Cheryl Strayed

That place of true healing is a fierce place. It's a giant place. It's a place of monstrous beauty and endless dark and glimmering light. And you have to work really, really, really hard to get there, but you can do it. — Cheryl Strayed

But as you are surely aware, forgiveness doesn't mean you let the forgiven stomp all over you once again. Forgiveness means you've found a way forward that acknowledges harm done and hurt caused without letting either your anger or your pain rule your life or define your relationship with the one who did you wrong. — Cheryl Strayed

The useless days will add up to something. The shitty waitressing jobs. The hours writing in your journal. The long meandering walks. The hours reading poetry and story collections and novels and dead people's diaries and wondering about sex and God and whether you should shave under your arms or not. These things are your becoming. — Cheryl Strayed

I listen to lots of music, especially Bach, opera (all periods), German lieder, chamber music, and rock, old and new. I can't listen to music while I write. It's too absorbing. — Cheryl Mendelson

I wanted blood to signify life, not death. — Cheryl Drake Harris

In your twenties you're becoming who you're going to be and so you might as well not be an asshole. — Cheryl Strayed

For the love of God, unless you're prepping for Rigoletto at the Met, go easy on the eyeliner. — Cheryl Cory

Perhaps by now I'd come far enough that I had the guts to be afraid. — Cheryl Strayed

I drew a line for myself. I never dated anyone that could hire me when I was first in Hollywood, and I think that kept me focused on what I was there to do and how I wanted to go about it. I took it a step at a time. — Cheryl Ladd

My grief is tremendous but my love is bigger. — Cheryl Strayed

The good things aren't a movie. There isn't enough to make a reel. The good things are a poem, barely longer than a haiku. There — Cheryl Strayed

I hate my body Hate what it remembers. Hate what it let him do. — Cheryl Rainfield

I do have a tendency to talk a lot at the poker table, which throws people off because they spend a lot of time trying to read me. But I talk a lot when I have a good hand and when I have a bad hand, too. Sometimes it annoys people so much they can't wait to get out of the tournament. And that can only be good for me. — Cheryl Hines

Jump high and hard with intention and heart. — Cheryl Strayed

Bad, quirky poetry might be better than some of the good stuff, because it really comes from the heart. — Cheryl Hines

Got To Be Real

What you find-ah
What you feel now
What you know-a
To be real

What you find, ah
(I think I love you, baby)
What you feel now
(I feel I need you, baby)
What you know-a
To be real

Ooh, your love's for real now
You know that your love is my love
My love is your love
Our love is here to stay

What you find-ah
What you feel now
What you know-a
To be real

Ooh, your love's for real now
You know that your love is my love
My love is your love
Our love is here to stay

What you find, ah
(I think I love you, baby)
What you feel now
(I feel I need you, baby)
What you know-a
To be real

What you find, ah
(I think I love you, baby)
What you feel now
(I feel I need you)
What you know-a
To be real... — Cheryl Lynn

You have to keep walking, no matter what. If you don't, it's a living death. You're just standing in one place dying. — Cheryl Strayed

I don't want to hurt you, Lucy, but I will — Cheryl McIntyre

Like anyone else, there are days I feel beautiful and days I don't, and when I don't, I do something about it. — Cheryl Tiegs

I actually don't have any fear of people reading Wild and going out unprepared. Because one of the best things that ever happened to me was that I went out unprepared. And when you really think about it, all I did wrong was that I took too much stuff, which is the most common backpacker mistake. The part that I wasn't prepared for is the part you can't prepare for. — Cheryl Strayed

However, there is also a ministry called the prayer closet. Humble servants, burdened with the cares of others, intercede on their behalf. This service offered up by uncelebrated prayer warriors is a mighty weapon. They call upon the power of God to thwart the schemes of the evil one. — Cheryl Zelenka

I don't trust anybody in my life except my mother and my dogs. — Cheryl Cole

Fountains of inconvenient feeling - and toward the frantic enticements of — Cheryl Strayed

We do not have the right to feel helpless. We must help ourselves. After destiny has delivered what it delivers, we are responsible for our lives. — Cheryl Strayed

I'm not one of those people who holds a grudge about anything. — Cheryl Cole

Grief doesn't have a face. — Cheryl Strayed

Small things such as this have saved me: how much I love my mother - even after all these years. How powerfully I carry her within me. My grief is tremendous but my love is bigger. So is yours. You are not grieving your son's death because his death was ugly and unfair. You're grieving it because you loved him truly. The beauty in that is greater than the bitterness of his death. — Cheryl Strayed

Turn wishful thinking into positive action. Those who take a proactive stance in their lives tend to have an ample supply of joy and pleasure — Cheryl Saban

Critasism is just a way of saying i'm jelous of your talents — Rayvon L. Browne

We often become our kindest, most ethical selves only by seeing what it feels like to be selfish assholes first. — Cheryl Strayed

A lot of times we set ourselves up to fail. It's interesting. A lot of times the resolutions we choose are the ones, like you said in the opening, we keep breaking over and over again. Sometimes it reflects parts of ourselves that we really need to accept instead of trying to change. — Cheryl Richardson

The first step in turning around your organization's performance? Think positively about the people you lead. — Cheryl A. Bachelder

I didn't exactly want to get divorced. I didn't exactly not want to. I believed in almost equal measure both that divorcing Paul was the right thing to do and that by doing so I was destroying the best thing I had. By then my marriage had become like the trail in that moment when I realized there was a bull in both directions. I simply made a leap of faith and pushed on in the direction where I'd never been. — Cheryl Strayed

There's a poem by Adrienne Rich I first read twenty years ago called "Splittings" that I thought of when I read your letter. The last two lines of the poem are: "I choose to love this time fore once / with all my intelligence. — Cheryl Strayed

If I were somebody dealing with chronic pain, I would see it as a challenge to manage my mind; even knowing that the effect of my thoughts is not only affecting my experience, but it is absolutely affecting the state of my health. — Cheryl Richardson

I can't hurt any more than I've been hurt, I can't cry any more than I've cried. I've been to the highest of highs and lowest of lows, so one day I'm going to find my middle ground and be happy. — Cheryl Cole

They're tortured by indecision and guilt and lust. They love X but want to fuck Z. It is the plight of almost every monogamous person at one time or another. We all love X but want to fuck Z. — Cheryl Strayed

Stop rehearsing life's failures. Use your beautiful imagination to visualize success. — Cheryl Richardson

It's funny, it never occurred to me that a movie star would play me. But now that she [Reese Witherspoon] is playing me, it's like, of course, it couldn't be anyone else! I don't know if you've seen pictures of Reese and me and Reese and my daughter Bobbi, who's named after my mother, and also plays me. There's a kind of resemblance. — Cheryl Strayed

Sometimes things don't change the way we expect or want. But that doesn't mean the Universe is not hard at work on our behalf. It just means that life has its own way of helping us. And that often means bringing outworn patterns of thought or behavior to our attention so we can move closer to that deep, authentic Self we long for and that is always already present. — Cheryl Eckl

Let go of the need to control. Trust in the wisdom of a divine plan. — Cheryl Richardson

I believe in soulmates, yes, but I believe you also have to work at love. I happen to believe your soulmate doesn't have to be your partner - your soulmate could be your best friend, your sibling, it doesn't have to be the person you marry. — Cheryl Cole

A country is judged by the actions at the top. Such is the way across the world. Nations are judged by their rulers, and not by those that live within the borders. — Cheryl Matthynssens

The Klamath tribe of Native Americans who witnessed the eruption believed it was a fierce battle between Llao, the spirit of the underworld, and Skell, the spirit of the sky. — Cheryl Strayed

I got an abortion and learned how to make dehydrated tuna flakes and turkey jerky and took a refresher course on basic first aid and practiced using my water purifier in my kitchen sink. I had to change. I had to change was the thought that drove me in those months of planning. Not into a different person, but back to the person I used to be
strong and responsible, clear-eyed and driven, ethical and good. And the PCT would make me that way. There, I'd walk and think about my entire life. I'd find my strength again, far from everything that had made my life ridiculous. — Cheryl Strayed

Well, when I was a little girl we had 17 cats once. They all lived outside, and they kept having more kittens. My mom made us put little ribbons around each kitten's neck, put them in a wagon, and go door-to-door around the neighborhood to try to give them away. — Cheryl Hines